Electoral Reform Committee on Aug. 31st, 2016

[Jane Hilderman]

A political scientist probably studies this somewhere in Canada.

My experience, and what I can recall, is that there aren't that many national level governments around the world that do it, but there have been occasions where, as I said, they've lowered it. Most recently, I cited the example of the Scottish national referendum on Scottish independence, as well as what's happening in P.E.I., where there's an important kind of question that's going to shape the future of a country or jurisdiction and it's important to have young people engaged.

I think, though, as said, that the 16-year-olds and 17-year-olds have shown up and wanted to have their voice heard. I think it opens the door to conversation that maybe they should be given a full say in other realms as well at election time.

[Taylor Gunn]

To emphasize the P.E.I. model, it's very P.E.I., but what a great homegrown model of how you would encourage and engage people in electoral reform. Interestingly, the ballot of the plebiscite will be ranked.

They're at markets with their public information. The MPs are going into schools. They've dropped the voting age. It's a great model.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Do you know some of the factors that were involved in considering the drop of the voting age from 21 to 18 when we did it back in 1970?

[Taylor Gunn]

In 1970?

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

I think it was, yes.

[Taylor Gunn]

I don't know about those, but I know that in P.E.I., politicians felt that if these kids were going to inherit the system, they should have a say in its choice.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

I'm probably out of time, right?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

You have 40 seconds.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Does anyone else want to comment?

[Dominic Vézina]

I often hear young people saying things like, “I can drive a car at 16, but I can't choose the person who will lead my country”.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Ms. Sahota, you have 30 seconds left.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Good point.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Okay, good.

Mr. Reid.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Mr. Chair, my understanding is that the reason the voting age was dropped in the United States—I don't know if this is true here—was that people could be drafted and sent off to fight and die for their country. There was a belief that it wasn't reasonable to deny the franchise to somebody who could be expected to make the ultimate sacrifice. We were not involved in the Vietnam War, so it may have been that we were catching up with what was seen as being a reasonable adjustment for other reasons. That's my understanding of where that came from.

I want to ask about electronic voting. Do we have any evidence that this would have a differential effect in terms of boosting the number of young participants as compared to people in other age ranges? Does anybody know?

[Jane Hilderman]

Sorry, could you repeat that?

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

I'm wondering whether having an electronic voting option available, so that you could vote electronically, would likely have a higher impact in attracting younger voters than other age groups.

[Jane Hilderman]

I think Taylor summarized that what we know is that electronic voting makes it a lot easier for people who are already planning on voting to vote. Right now, if you are planning to vote, you have to think about where your polling station is, what the path is to get there, and whether you are going to vote before or after work, during your lunch hour, in-between classes, and all those sorts of things. It takes away some of those steps, and the point is that you've been motivated to vote.

How many people face those types of logistical barriers? Those barriers are there, and they are real. I think if you are a highly motivated person, then you overcome them. There are probably some young people who are not voting because it's too much of an effort to get to the polling station. I think creating the option to vote online would appeal to them, but those who are set on going to vote will find a way.

On the point about whether we can do it, I would say that as a world, it seems like we're on track to doing more and more things online. It makes sense to be at least undertaking pilots at this stage to figure out how to make it work—not large scale pilots, but a start at testing and figuring out exactly the answers to these questions with reliable data. Do young people seize this opportunity, or are they much happier to have a voting booth selfie?

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Right.

This is more of a comment than a question. I think it makes sense to start with a by-election, rather than a general election, for reasons of scale and because the consequences of some kind of mess are reduced.

I think that electronic voting, like the postal ballot, has to be a supplement as opposed to a replacement for the other ways of voting. That's just an observation.

I have something else to mention. Young voters who have moved recently—and young people do move more frequently—are more likely not to know where their voting station is or not to have received a card from Elections Canada telling them where their voting station is.

I heard a story about trying to get greater student participation that makes this point in an experiment to find out whether people would be more motivated to go to get something good, such as a tetanus shot, by getting informational advertising or advertising that was fear-based, such as horrible photos of people with lockjaw and so on. This was back in the sixties. Professors then did what professors always do, and experimented with the student body. They sent out, to different parts of the campus, different ads about the free tetanus shots that students could get at the student centre. The results were so unimpressive for both groups that they had to drop it.

Then the idea was picked up again at another university, but this time they included a map of how to get to the student centre—and surprise, surprise, the number of participants went way up. Knowing either where you should go to vote or that you can vote from home makes.... I guess I'm pitching something as opposed to asking questions.

Maybe you could comment on that.

[Jane Hilderman]

I think one of the reasons we had such great youth turnout in the last election was the fact that there were a lot of widespread pilots on university campuses to set up polling stations. It sounds obvious to put a polling station on campus where people go to school, but we hadn't done that, and it was well received.

The other thing Elections Canada did in the country was to open up special offices so people could vote in their home riding, because as a university student, you've moved and you don't know where you are. You maybe don't know the local politics, but you do know politics back home, and you still care about it. You could vote through a special ballot at any time up to several weeks in advance.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

You might still be legally a resident of your home riding.

[Jane Hilderman]

Yes, that's it, so it's all of those things.

Interestingly, and I saw recently in the B.C. provincial election that you could show up at any polling station to cast your ballot on election day. I think that accessibility is fascinating.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Yes.

We'll go to Mr. Boulerice now.

Thank you.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It's interesting to hear about the views of young people, their place in the political environment and their participation.

Ensuring that Parliament is a reflection of society is also a priority for us, as progressive people. Our goal is gender parity, as well as proper representation of first nations and cultural minorities. However, we rarely hear about how young people are being represented.

In 2011, at least six university students were elected in Quebec under the NDP banner, including the youngest person elected in the history of Canada, Pierre-Luc Dusseault, who was 19 at the time. He was even re-elected last year.

Mr. Vézina, I would like to hear your thoughts not only on youth voter turnout, but also on the importance that parties should be placing on having young candidates. I wonder if you could also expand on what you called “generational suicide”. That is a loaded expression.

What do you mean by that?

[Dominic Vézina]

Thank you.

Those are good questions. I'm not sure I'm in the best position to answer them. I will give you my opinion, but it does not represent that of INM. What I really want to say is that it's a global process. The more young people understand the system in which they live, the more likely they are to gain real-life experience, either through student councils or student associations. Since they will be interested in politics, they will be more likely to get involved later on and even run as candidates. That goes without saying.

When I mentioned generational suicide, I was referring to the results. Over the past 40 years in Canada, youth voter turnout among 18- to 34-year-olds has dropped from 70% to 30%. Those figures are from 2004. That is a drastic drop. Young people no longer see themselves reflected in politics and often feel as though the issues don't concern them. The socio-demographic curve, in Quebec and Canada, is dropping for that specific age group. They no longer relate, and that is what is meant by generational suicide. No one is speaking on their behalf anymore, about issues that matter to them. Inevitably, since they no longer vote, everyone else stops worrying about them.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Less and less.

Thank you.

Ms. Hilderman, in its report on the quality of Canadian democratic life, Samara Canada gives the Canadian federation a “C” grade. That's not terrible, but there's room for improvement. I remember coming home from school with a C on a test, and I wouldn't have a good evening.

Are there any international models we could emulate to improve our performance? How did you decide on the “C” grade?